


vita

by heavyliesthecrown



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: 2x21, Angst, F/M, Interlude, Introspection, because i love introspection, or is it technically a tag or a coda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-10
Updated: 2018-05-10
Packaged: 2019-05-04 22:51:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14603451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heavyliesthecrown/pseuds/heavyliesthecrown
Summary: "In death, he feels most alive."2x21 interlude.





	vita

In death, he feels most alive. 

He’s wondered about death before. What it might feel like, how it might happen, if it’ll hurt. He’s wondered. He’s spent time thinking about it; not too much time, though, because every time he does, there’s an inevitable, overwhelming sense of claustrophobia that sets in, followed by an uncomfortable, erratic beating of his heart. But it’s human instinct, he thinks, to wonder about death. It’s one of the very few things that mankind shares, a rite of passage every single person has or will have to go through, and yet, it’s so singular. There’s so much that's unknown about it until the moment actually arrives.

It’s here now.

He’s not scared. As much as he hadn’t wanted to admit that to himself, he always thought he would be just because of the great unknown there is surrounding death. The unknown can be a scary thing. But, he figures, there _is_ so much more he knows now. He knows how he’s going to die, and he knows that _yes_ , it’s probably going to be painful, probably excruciatingly so. He knows he’s going to be killed. He’s not going to die because of his own stupidity, he’s not dying because he’s accidentally driven himself off a cliff, and he’s not going to die calmly and peacefully after a long, fulfilling life in his bed at ninety; he’s going to be killed by someone else’s hand. That’s how it’s going to happen.

He also knows that he’s doing the right thing now, the noble thing - he’s made a promise to a friend that he didn’t – _couldn’t_ – keep, and that friend is dead now. But still standing are so many people he loves, and he can save them. By doing this he can save them. One for the lives of many, the many that he loves. His life for the greater good.

It’s how he makes it right. 

He feels alive.

The wind, though there isn’t much of it at all, is sharp and piercing on his skin. There’s a palpable electricity in the air even though the power has cut out long ago, and it thrums through every part of him, from the wet ground up through his shoes, to the very edges of his fingertips. He feels the night itself, the darkness, the stillness, as if it were a tangible thing. 

It’s a great and wonderful thing to feel so alive, and it's such a cruel twist of fate that he only gets to feel this kind of vibrancy in the face of death. 

Once, when he was seven, he’d asked his grandmother to tell him something about death. He didn’t mean anything by it and he absolutely hadn’t intended to make his grandmother upset, he’d told his mother when she firmly grasped him by the wrist and told him how inappropriate that was. She was older than him, he’d said innocently, and a little closer to facing it death than was, so surely, she’d know a thing or two more about it than him. 

His grandmother had simply tutted at his mother, said _‘Gladys, don’t hold the boy like that,’_ and given a tired, feeble pat to the worn sofa next to her. 

His mother had probably been right – that'd undoubtedly been an insensitive thing for him to ask his grandmother. But he’d been right, too. She did know more than he did.

 _‘I don’t know much about death, Forsythe,’_ she’d said. She’d always insisted on calling him that. _‘I’ve never experienced it. But I hear that you shouldn’t die with regrets.’_

He’s glad that he’s not going to.  

He has wishes. There are so, so many things he wishes right here and right now. But he doesn't have regrets.

He wishes that he’d gotten a chance to tell Veronica who her father really is, the kind of man he really is. At her core, he doesn’t think that Veronica is a bad person, not the way her father is an honest-to-god bad person, and he thinks she deserves to know the truth about the man she so often and so blindly defends – that he’s turning the town his father had grown up in, that he grew up in, he’s turning the town that he fell in love in into an actual hell on earth. Her father has orchestrated and signed off on all of this, and even though he won’t be the one delivering the final blow, he’s the one who rang the death knell. He thinks that Veronica is strong - she’s strong enough to fight against her father instead of fighting for him, and he wishes he could tell her that.

He wishes he could tell Hiram Lodge exactly which of the nine circles of hell he’d like to send his sorry ass to burn for all eternity in.

He wishes he could tell his mom that he doesn’t hold it against her that she took Jellybean and left him here – his sister deserves better than this life and he thinks that if they’d stayed, she’d likely get roped into all of this, too. He wishes he could tell Jellybean how much growing up can suck sometimes, and that even though _‘being cool’_ might seem like the most important thing in the world right now, it’s not. There’s something to be said about taking your time.

He wishes he could tell his dad that none of this is his fault. He made the decision to come here tonight, he was the one who didn’t listen when he'd been explicitly told to stay away from the Serpents, stay away from Penny. Now, this is his grave to lie in. He wants to tell his dad to not drink himself to death over this because he just might, and to keep fighting for Riverdale. This is their town, this is their small, macabre, scary hellhole of a town. But this is is their home, and home is something worth fighting for. 

He wishes he could tell Archie that he’s sorry that something as stupid as distinction and divide came between them the way it did. That’s all this really boils down to at the core of it – Bulldogs and Serpents, Northside and Southside, Archie versus him – and he realizes now that it’s such an incredibly stupid thing to lose a friend over, to lose a brother over. Blood runs thicker than that.

He wishes that he could’ve gotten the chance to tell Archie to take care of Betty since he won’t be able to anymore. He knows that Betty is so capable in so many ways, but there’s so much she keeps to herself, too. He’s expressive when it comes to his emotions and thoughts, but Betty is so unlike him in that way, and he knows there’s so much going on up in her head that she needs someone to help her with. She needs someone to remind her that it’s okay to talk, it’s okay to just feel sometimes. 

And he wishes that he could’ve told Archie that he can have his video game collection. It’s not much of a collection, but still, he wants Archie to have it.  

Betty.

She’d been his one call, his last call, and even though he’s beyond thankful that he doesn’t have to die without knowing he got to say the words to her he wanted to most, there are so many things he wishes when it comes to Betty.

He wishes he’d stayed on the phone with her for even a second more, because maybe she just might’ve said those words back to him - _I love you, too_ \- and that would have been a nice thing to hear before death. He knows she does, he knows, but it would’ve been nice to hear just the same. He wishes that he could’ve said goodbye in person, that he could’ve felt her in his arms one final time, felt her kiss him, felt her hold him. 

He wishes that he’d have gotten the chance to see what the rest of his life with her might’ve looked like, because even though he knows he’s young, he also knows, more so than anything else, the unwavering truth tied into the last words he’d spoken to her. _‘I’ll never stop loving you,’_ he’d said, and he’d meant it. He’s never meant anything more.

Maybe they’d might’ve gotten married one day far into the future, or maybe they might not have. He’ll never know. Maybe they would’ve had a kid. It’s always been a scary thought – _kids_ – having to take care of another human being when he feels like he can barely take care of himself at times, but now, it’s not as scary as he’d once thought it’d been. Nothing really is when you’re standing where he is. Maybe they would’ve had a girl with Betty’s eyes, because he loves her eyes and the way they look at him, like they really see him for him. A girl with her mother’s drive and spirit because that’s a girl who’ll be destined for success in this world. She’ll be a survivor and she’ll be strong. A kid might’ve been nice, he thinks now.

Maybe they even might've had a second kid, one with a name of his own. He doesn’t think the name he’s shared with his father and grandfather has brought any type of luck or good will, so it’s probably time to change it up.

He wishes he could know a bit more about the life they might’ve led and the people they’d have become. He thinks that it might’ve been extraordinary.

He wishes for her to be okay, and he wishes that he could tell her that even though it’s fine if she’s sad over this - _him_ \- for a little while, he doesn’t want her to be sad forever. Life is short, too short in his case, and it’s not worth it for her to be sad for too long. He wishes, and only if it’s not too much for her, that she’ll remember him and carry him with her. He loves her so, he always will, and he never wants her to forget how worthy of love she is.

He wishes that he could tell her that he wants her to be happy, the happiest she can be, and to find someone else to love. It’s such a wonderful thing, love, and he wants her to have that in her life. He wishes that he could tell her that if there is some kind of great beyond, the kind where he’s allowed to watch over the people he loves, that he’ll be doing everything in his power on his end to make sure that she’s safe. Not in a creepy, haunting sort of way, and he’ll even promise to look away when she falls in love with someone else, too, but he wants her to know that for the rest of her life, she’ll have a guardian angel at her side. Maybe not an angel, though, that’s not really his style. Maybe just a guardian.

But he’ll be there for her, even if she can’t see him. He'll be there for her, always.

He wishes that he had the time to thank her for loving him. He’s never known love like this before, the kind of love that makes you feel invincible, the kind of love that brings you calm as you stare at the harbingers of death, and he knows just how lucky he is to have been loved by her.

He faces them now, his reckoning, his death, and since he’s feeling good, he starts smarting off.

“Thirty to one,” he says. “Are you that afraid of me?”

He’s feeling alive.

“The only scary thing is what we’re going to do to your girlfriend when we find her.”

You shouldn’t die with regrets.

_You shouldn't die with regrets._

He doesn’t have regrets, but he knows he’ll regret it if he doesn’t do this.

He’ll regret it if he doesn’t stand up for her one final time. He’ll regret it if he doesn’t go down swinging, so he draws back his fist and with everything he has left in him, he punches regret right in its oddly painted, ugly face. 

Then comes the pain. 

The first few punches don’t hurt - they come on so suddenly and from every direction that he doesn’t have the time to register pain. 

And then he does. 

His instinct is to scream out for them to stop, to please stop, he’ll do anything if they do. It hurts. Badly, blindingly. But he’s nothing if not a fighter, he’s nothing if he’s not a man with honor, and so instead, he curls up the best he can and just waits for it to pass. It will soon. He doesn’t know which comes first - the passing out or the actual dying – admittedly, he hasn’t been paying much attention in biology class recently, but he knows that one of the two, maybe even both at the same time, will come soon enough. 

He just has to wait.

Things start to go slower then. Things start to hurt less, and it’s so cold all of a sudden - he thinks he might be reaching the beginning of the end.

He thinks about her. He’s decided a while ago that she’s the last thing he wants to think about when he dies. He thinks about the way she smiles at him, the sound of her laugh, the feel of her, the unmatchable, indescribable feel of her. _What a life_ , he thinks, _to have been able to love her_.

_What a life, to have been loved by her._

It becomes hard to breathe, and it starts growing dark. He always thought it’d be some kind of light at the end, that’s what the songs and the books have always said, but in a way, he likes the darkness a little more. It suits him better.

 _I lived a good life_ , he thinks as the world goes black.

_With her, I lived the best of lives._

 

 

 

_**Fin.** _


End file.
